Organization Challenge

Yes!  I am still working on this 21 days of getting Organized Challenge - still making up a lot of my own days!  You can click here and here to see the first 13 days of the challenge

So, day 14 at A Bowl Full of Lemons was Under the Bathroom Sink.  My bathroom sink was already organized for one main reason, there is very little room under there!  I just keep the toilet paper and personal items under there and that's it.  So instead I tackled this bin:

 This bin held a bunch of misc scrapbooking projects that I had taken out of my desk and moved downstairs.  So, I took some bins I got at the dollar store and sorted each project into a bin.


 So my bin now looks (or looked!) like this - nice and empty.  I just realized I forgot to snap a picture of the bins - I'll have to do that in another post.

These two Creative Memory boxes I made part of this project too - notice one is empty?  I combined all the pictures left into one box and can now use the other memory manager box to store current pages.  I'm so excited that this is done!

Day 15 was Medicine/Vitamin Organization.  I actually really like what she has done - storing it high above the microwave in some really great storage containers.  Right now mine is stored in the bathroom in a basket on a high shelf.  And yes, it is already organized.  So I did the shelf in our bedroom instead.

 The before shot - this area had just gotten so messed up due to rearranging some things - I needed to just take 10 minutes and organize this so it looked neat.

And this is the finished project.  I used some pretty bins I got at the Dollar tree to store my body sprays and current purses; I removed the scrapbooking paper file and moved it down in my "craft" area and the laundry basket once again has a home.  The bottom shelf holds some current scrapbooking projects.  I like when this looks neat :-)

Day 16 is the Fridge.  Honestly, I clean my fridge every week (it's a Flylady thing!) So this is also done.  I can show my work in progress - my files:

 I forgot to take a complete before picture - but this is the drawer with half the files in it.

 The other half are already in this once empty bin :-)

And here are all the files - waiting to be sorted and re-organized.  One of the things I struggle with is sorting space so I decided to make this my project bin - I now have a home for any project I'm in the middle of!!  I can work on one file at a time, sort on the table but, when it's time to stop, I can stack the items neatly in this bin and move it to my bedroom to store behind my mirror.  I'm slowly figuring out solutions for living in tight quarters while keeping things neat and clean!  This project is still in the process - I'll show the finished project when I'm done!

Day's 17 and 18 I have not completed yet but wanted to share links to the posts on A Bowl Full of Lemons.

Day 17 is Mail.  She gives a great solution for keeping up with mail.  I am working on a smaller version of this and Hope to get it done soon. 

Day 18 is Keepsakes.  I love, love LOVE the idea that she shares for keepsakes.  I scrapbook pictures galore but have wondered what to do with all of those special projects/pictures the kids make.  Well, I will be creating these binders for each of the boys as soon as I can get a chance.  The nice thing is that right now, I don't have any of these papers laying around  - Josh is just starting to get more into art so I'm sure I'll have some soon!!

So, hopefully this weekend, I can finish up my filing, finish up my mail solution, and I have a bathroom cabinet to clean up for Day 18. 

I'll post those once I finish!

Homemade Playdough

My sister-in-law made Josh some homemade play dough a month or so ago and gave me the recipe.  I had been thinking about making some as it is another teaching idea I've see alot on blog land.  So, here's an easy recipe! (I know there are about a million differant recipes out there - they all seem to have the same basic ingredients, the measurments just change slightly . .)

1 cup flour
1/2 cup salt
1 cup water
2 teaspoons cream of tarter
1 Tablespoon oil
food coloring or 1 packet unsweeted kool-aid
Flavoring (peppermint, almond, lemon, ect)

Mix everything together and heat on medium until the play dough pulls away from the sides

This is what it looks like mixed up.  Because we are doing a winter unit - I wanted white play dough so I did not add any coloring.  Instead, I added some silver glitter.

Do not walk away from this - it pulled away from the sides in about 2 minutes.

After letting it cool enough to handle, knead it a little and store it in an air tight container

And here are some pictures of us playing with it this week :-)

Josh was not a fan of the texture of the playdough - I had to "smoosh" it out for him.

He liked to take the cookie cutters and place them on top of the already cut out shape.

Notice the one figure technique?  That is so he wouldn't touch the play dough!

 I want to share one other learning game we play right now and it is :

Yep, Wheel of Fortune!  It comes on at the start of Bath time so we pause the TV.  See, the other night, Josh and I were watching it and every time a letter was turned he would say "T", or "R" - reading the letters.  So now, we practice our letter sounds while watching this game show.  How fun is that???  Darryl and I commented how we both watched this growing up (along with Jeopardy) and now, we are back to watching it again.  And yes, we do watch Jeopardy too!

And one more fun learning idea :

That's right, folks, Tater Tots!  I saw these a few weeks ago while grocery shopping and since I had planned fries to go with lunch one day, I bought these instead.  (My boys LOVE Tater Tots anyway!)  We used them to practice letters before eating them.  Eventually we will do things like spell out their names, and write other words too!  How fun - eating and learning :-)